


The Origins of Bucky

by KingHippiedude (missreader)



Series: Genderfluid Thor (this will probably have a better name later) [7]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Coming Out, Gen, Trans, Trans Bucky, Trans Character, Trans Male Character, Transgender, Transgender Bucky, Transman Bucky, transgender character, transvengers, transvengers assemble
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-10
Updated: 2016-09-13
Packaged: 2018-03-17 07:33:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3520748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missreader/pseuds/KingHippiedude
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve Rogers is in high school when his best friend comes out as transgender. Thus begins Bucky's search for self and transition and Steve's exploration of transgender identities, the gender binary (and how ridiculous it is), and all that that entails.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This story is a prequel to the rest of the Genderfluid Thor series and takes place entirely before that series starts. I decided to write it because of a couple comments I got regarding Steve’s knowledge of pronoun courtesy and gender manners. I will get back to the main body of the story eventually, but Bucky's story felt like it needed to be told, so here it is. This will be a multi-chapter fic and will continue up until the time of the beginning of the series with probable Bucky appearances in later works within the main timeline.
> 
> I was seriously tempted to write something shippy, but I resisted because I wanted this fic to be about friendship more than anything else. (And it wouldn't fit in the 'verse as well if it were shippy.) Steve and Bucky are super intimate and will sometimes do things associated with romantic/sexual relationships, but there are zero sexy-times and nothing is done with romantic intentions. Just lots of platonic intimacy, cuddles, and love.

“Hey Stevie! Wait up!” Jamie called.

Steve turned toward her voice, stopping in his tracks as he did as she asked. Unfortunately, that meant the bullies caught up too.

“Hey ‘Stevie’,” one of them crooned. Steve could practically hear the air quotes around the nickname. “What are these girls doin’ hangin’ around you all the time? Not like you’d know how to bang a chick if she fell on your dick.” Then turning to Jamie in a voice that was probably supposed to be seductive, “I can show you a good time, honey…”

Jamie cringed. “My name is not ‘Honey’,” she said, fuming now, “and until you figure that out, I don’t think you’ll be showing anyone a ‘good time’.”

“At least not if you don’t want your eye blacked for your troubles,” Steve muttered under his breath, unheard by the other boys, as one of them said, “ooh… this one’s feisty, boys.”

“I’ll show you feisty!” Steve yelled, about to punch the idiot in the face when Jamie grabbed him, holding him back.

“It’s not worth it, Stevie,” she said more calmly than she felt. “Let’s just find Peggy and get out of here- speak of the devil, there she is.”

“Hey boys,” Peggy said threateningly, then calmly turned towards her friends and said, “Let’s get outta here.”

Now that the bullies were outnumbered, they seemed perfectly willing to let them leave. Peggy had quite a reputation around the school. She wasn’t one to back down from a fight, or to lose. Not that Steve or Jamie ever backed down either, but they tended to brawl and get themselves just as beat up as the bullies, whereas Peggy had a black belt in Tae Kwon Do and tended to be pretty neat about taking down any would-be assailants before it got to the mess of a brawl. Peggy’s reputation was a fearsome thing, and it had saved Steve and Jamie countless injuries since they had become friends freshman year.

“Thanks for saving our asses back there,” Jamie said to Peggy as they walked down the block to Steve’s house.

“No problem. That’s what friends do, right? Not like you two haven’t had my back just as often. We still on for girls’ night at Anna’s this weekend?”

“Uh… I guess…” Jamie said, looking a little uncomfortable. “I know you don’t want to go alone.”

“I know it’s not really your thing, but you really should hang out with people other than Steve at least occasionally. It’ll be fun.”

“Hey! I resent that. I do hang out with people other than Steve. I hang out with you, don’t I?”

“Yeah,” she said, “when Steve is there too.”

Jamie looked a little confused, like she hadn’t realised that before. “Oh. Well, I’ll be hanging out with you and other non-Steve people this weekend.”

“See ya then, Jamie,” Peggy said, sauntering off to her own house across the street as Steve and Jamie made their way up the stairs outside Steve’s apartment.

“I don’t hang out with you too much, do I?” Jamie asked Steve, a little fearfully.

“Jamie, you have been my best friend since we were in diapers. I don’t care what anyone else thinks. I love hanging out with you, and you are always welcome here.”

“Okay. Thanks, Stevie,” Jamie said, seeming relieved.

They tossed their school bags and coats down at the door and settled in on the couch, flipping channels on the TV.

That’s where they still were when Steve’s mom arrived an hour later. Once she had changed out of her scrubs, she started preparing dinner. Steve and Jamie eagerly volunteered to help in the kitchen and found themselves chopping vegetables and stirring things on the stove as needed.

Soon, dinner was ready, and the three of them gathered round the table to eat. It was a simple meal, but it was warm and hearty and made with love, like everything Sarah Rogers made. Sarah asked Steve and Jamie about school, and they told her pretty much everything about their days except for the encounter with the bullies.

After the meal had been eaten and everything cleaned up, Steve and Jamie were alone again, and they went to Steve’s bedroom as usual. But rather than flop down on the bed with Steve, Jamie perched on her friend’s desk chair, legs pulled up in the chair with her. looking like she had something to say. Steve sat up straighter and did his best to be calm and patient.

After what felt like an eternity, Jamie opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. She looked terrified, so Steve took her hand and said, “It’s okay, Jamie. Take your time.”

She started crying a little, seemingly helpless to stop the stream of tears, sobs catching in her throat, but she grabbed a piece of paper and started writing. It took long enough that Jamie was able to calm down enough to stop the tears, but it looked like they were ready to start flowing again at the drop of a hat. Rather than try to speak again, she just held the paper out in Steve’s direction.

He took it gently and started reading:

> _I don’t know how to say this or if you’ll understand. But maybe I can write it. I’ll do my best to explain. I don’t know if there was really a moment where I realised that I didn’t feel like all the girls around me. I guess I just kind of always knew that there was something different about me; I never quite fit in.. It just took me a long time to figure out why. Over the summer, I was watching TV, and there was this rerun marathon of Ugly Betty on, so I started watching it. And there was this character on there who was transgender. She had been born a boy, but she always knew that she was a girl. And the whole show was crazy, and the characters were pretty messed up. But there was something about Alexis that really just made sense to me. And while I was watching this insane show, something just clicked. And the point is, I’m transgender. I’m not a girl; I never have been. And I want to stop having to pretend. I want people to realise that I’m a guy. But mostly, I just needed to tell you because you’re my best friend, and ever since I figured it out, it’s felt like I’ve been lying to you. I hated that, but I didn’t know how to tell you. And I’m so scared that you’ll hate me and stop being my friend. And I just don’t know what to do anymore, but I know that I needed to tell you._

Jamie tried to watch Steve’s facial expressions as he read the letter, but couldn’t do it and turned away before he finished, afraid of seeing hatred in his eyes. So, it was a surprise when Steve launched himself off the bed, eyes and cheeks wet with tears, and pulled Jamie into the tightest hug he could manage.

“I could never hate you, Jamie. You’re my best friend. You’re family. Always.”

They were both sobbing openly and collapsed into the bed together, wrapped around each other so securely that it was nearly impossible to tell where one of them ended and the other began. When they had both calmed down a little, Steve wiped the tears off of Jamie’s face and said, “I don’t really know anything about being transgender. Do you think you could explain it more? What it means for you?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know a lot either. I Googled some stuff and tried to look at things in the library, but I didn’t want to get caught. I just know that I’m a guy, and I always have been. I just didn’t have the words to describe what I was feeling before, so I just assumed that I really was a girl and I was just different. And it wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t really me either.” And after a brief pause, Jamie continued, “You’re the only person I’ve told. Nobody else knows, but do you think when it’s just us, you could call me ‘Buck’ use masculine pronouns? I know ‘Jamie’ can be a guy’s name, but I want something different, and my middle name is ‘Buchanan’ so I thought ‘Buck’ could be short for that…” he trailed off, running out of air.

“You got it, Bucky.”

“Punk! I said ‘Buck’ not ‘Bucky’.”

“You call me ‘Stevie’, jerk.”

And just like that, the two friends were laughing just like always. A weight had been lifted from Bucky’s shoulders, and the world had not yet intruded on their intimate bubble. They laughed until they cried and cried until they laughed, and Bucky spent the night just like so many times before.


	2. Chapter 2

Girls’ Night hadn’t actually been too bad. Bucky had always liked hanging out with Peggy. She was the toughest girl he knew and his best friend after Steve. And the other girls weren’t too bad either. He didn’t know any of them particularly well, but they were all friendly. They spent the evening watching movies, eating junk food, and painting their nails. Honestly, if it weren’t for the fact that everyone believed him to be a girl, it would have been a pretty awesome night. But now that he had come out to Steve and been accepted, he felt more and more compelled to just tell everyone. He was tired of being perceived as a girl.

“Hey Peggy,” he said as they walked home late the next morning. “Can I talk to you about something?”

“Sure, Jamie. Go ahead.”

“Umm… I… can we go inside? It’s gonna take some time to explain.”

“Yeah. Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay. Just.... It’s complicated.”

Once they were in Peggy’s room, Bucky did much the same thing as he had with Steve and claimed the desk chair while Peggy took the bed.

“This is just the second time I’ve talked to anybody about this, so it might not be the best explanation. Just let me try and explain before you say anything, okay?” Peggy just nodded in response, and Bucky continued, “Okay. So… I’m transgender. I’ve never really felt like a girl. I’m not feminine or girly, and I’ve never liked feminine things. And I just thought that maybe I was a tomboy or something. But it still never felt quite right, and then I heard about the term transgender, and things started making more sense. I’m not girly because I’m not a girl. I’m a guy.... I guess that’s it,” Bucky finished nervously.

“Okay. That’s kind of a lot to take in. Are you sure? You know not all women are feminine.”

“I know. And I’m sure. It’s not just that I’m not feminine, it’s that people perceiving me as a woman makes me uncomfortable; going through puberty and growing breasts and starting my period made me uncomfortable, still makes me uncomfortable.”

“A lot of girls feel uncomfortable about their bodies during puberty, Jamie. And there’s nothing wrong with being a woman. It’s just the patriarchy and the misogynistic stereotypes that it perpetuates that teach children that. You can still be strong and independent without pretending to be a guy, Jamie.”

“I’m not pretending to be a guy; I’ve been pretending to be a girl for sixteen years,” Bucky said angrily.

“You definitely don’t have a penis. I’ve seen you changing enough times to know if you were just pretending to be a girl.”

Bucky wanted to tell her that a penis doesn’t make a man, that genetalia don’t matter, but he couldn’t speak. He knew that if he opened his mouth all that would come out were sobs. He held back the tears as best as he could and ran from Peggy’s house, barely remembering to grab his bag on the way out.

He didn’t really think about where he was going, but the next thing he knew, he was standing in front of Steve’s apartment. He took a deep, shaky breath and tried to wipe the tears off his face before he knocked. Sarah Rogers took one look at him and ushered him in without a word, pulling him into a hug.

“Steve’s in the shower, but he should be out in a few minutes. Do you want a cup of tea while you wait?”

“Yes, please,” Bucky choked out, curling up on the worn-out sofa. As soon as she got the water was heating for tea, Steve’s mom brought him a chocolate muffin.

“You wanna talk about it, honey?”

The endearment would normally make him cringe, but coming from Steve’s mom it didn’t sound patronizing. It just sounded like a mother asking after her child. Steve’s mom really was like a mother to him. But he wasn’t ready to talk to her yet, so he just shook his head.

“Okay,” she replied, running a hand through his hair before returning to the kitchen.

She returned a few minutes later with two cups of tea and joined him on the sofa. They sat in silence, listening to the shower running then shutting off and the sound of doors opening and closing a moment later. It wasn’t an uncomfortable silence, but Bucky was relieved when Steve appeared a minute later.

“There’s still some hot water, and we have tea bags and cocoa if you want a cup, Steve. I’m gonna head to the store for some groceries,” his mom said. It was obvious she was just doing it to give them some space for Bucky to talk, and he appreciated her all the more for it.

Steve fixed himself a cup of cocoa as his mom grabbed her things and headed out. As soon as she was gone, he sat down next to Bucky on the couch. They both sipped their drinks in silence for a moment before Steve asked, “you wanna talk about it, Buck?”

He shook his head, unable to speak, overwhelmed again with emotion. He set down his cup and pushed the blanket aside before launching himself at Steve, curling into his friend’s side as close as he possible could. Steve shifted a little, trying to get them more comfortable, then started petting Bucky, carding fingers through his hair and smoothing hands down his back. Steve grabbed the blanket and wrapped it around the two of them as best he could. When Bucky’s tears stopped, Steve gently dried his face and picked up their drinks, one arm still wrapped tightly around his friend. Bucky’s tea was only lukewarm by this point, but he finished it off while Steve finished his cocoa.

“I’m not just internalizing patriarchal misogyny, am I?”

“What makes you ask that?”

“I talked to Peggy earlier. She said there’s nothing wrong with being a woman, and I can still do whatever I want, and it’s just the patriarchy that says otherwise. And I don’t have to be feminine. Peggy does plenty of things that aren’t very feminine, like help us out in fights, but she’s still a girl. And she’s always goin’ on about feminism and how important it is and that girls can do and be whatever and whoever they want. And now I feel like I’m letting her down by saying that I don’t want to be a woman. Because there shouldn’t be anything wrong with being a woman, but it still feels wrong, and I’m so confused…” his voice broke on the last word, crying for what felt like the hundredth time.

“Bucky, there _is_ nothing wrong with being a woman, if you’re actually a woman, but Peggy has no right to make you feel guilty for not being a woman, nor does anyone else, for that matter. You are the only person who has the right to define your gender. I did some research this week,” he added by way of explanation. “Peggy was wrong to say that. I’m sure her intention wasn’t to hurt you, but it’s still not okay. You say you aren’t a girl, that you’re a guy, and that’s enough for me.”

“But, I’m still so confused, Steve… I know that being a girl has never felt right, and that being a guy really does, but…” he trailed off.

“It’s okay. You don’t have to know everything, Buck. You’re allowed to be confused; the world is a complicated place.” Steve whispered and returned to petting Bucky, shifting until they were both lying down on the couch.

Bucky was exhausted. There hadn’t been a lot of sleeping at girls’ night, and crying so much always wore him out. So it didn’t take long for him to drift off to sleep, lying half on top of Steve.

He wasn’t sure how long he had been asleep when he woke up, but based on the light it couldn’t have been very long. Bucky was alone on the couch. Steve had gotten up at some point, and Bucky could hear him now in the kitchen, so he got up and headed in there, wearing the blanket like a cape.

“Hey, how was your nap?” Steve greeted him with a smile.

“Not bad. Whatcha fixin’?”

“Mac and cheese. I haven’t eaten since breakfast, and it’s past lunch time now. Sorry I left you alone, but I got hungry.” His stomach rumbled, as if in confirmation.

Bucky smiled, “Mind if I join you? I’m a little hungry myself.”

“Of course. It should be ready now actually.” Steve turned back to the pasta on the stove and adjusted the dial, pulling the pot off to drain its contents. Bucky watched from the table as Steve mixed in the cheese sauce; Steve’s cooking skills were seriously limited, but he could fix boxed mac and cheese, which was plenty good enough for the two of them.

Just a minute later, Steve was serving up the mac and cheese, making sure that he grabbed a fork for Bucky because he was picky like that. Steve always laughed at Bucky’s refusal to use a spoon with his mac and cheese but never forgot. “Thanks,” Bucky said, quiet.

“No problem,” Steve replied.

They were mostly quiet as they ate, and when they has finished off the entire pot of mac and cheese, Steve suggested that they watch a movie. Bucky hesitated, saying he should probably go home, but didn’t need much convincing to stay a little longer. He snuggled right up against Steve again, the moment they were on the couch. Steve queued up _Tangled_ because he knew that Bucky loved Disney princess movies, no matter how much he insisted otherwise, and Steve loved them too.

At some point during the movie, Steve turned to Bucky and asked, “do you want to talk to my mom about all this? I think she would understand, and I’d like to talk to her.”

“I don’t know if I can...:”

“Hey, it’s okay. You don’t have to tell anybody you don’t want to.”

“Could you tell her, Stevie? I want her to know, but I can’t talk to her.”

“You sure, Buck? You really don’t have to.”

“Yeah. I’m sure.”

They were silent for the rest of the movie. Steve assumed that Bucky had fallen asleep, but when he looked down, Bucky was still awake.

“I really do need to head home now. It’s just about dinner time, and my parents will be wondering where I am if I don’t get home soon.”

“Okay, Bucky. You know you’re always welcome here, right?”

“Yeah, Steve, I know.”

Bucky was loathe to leave the comfort of the Rogers home, but he had been serious about needing to be home before dinner. It wasn’t unusual for him to be out all day, and his parents rarely cared. He had too many siblings for them to be too worried about keeping track of them all, and Bucky was a teenager now. But tomorrow was Sunday, which meant church and family time, and everyone was expected to be home and behave.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve talks to his ma

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It has been way too long since I updated this work. So sorry, I hope this chapter is alright. I'm really bad about leaving WIP for way too long and getting distracted by other things, but I'm trying to go back and keep working on them.

Sarah Rogers returned as Bucky was leaving. “Hi Ms. Rogers,” he said. “Thanks for the tea and letting me stay.”

“Of course, Jamie. Any time. Have a nice evening!”

“Bye,” Bucky replied, a bit more timid than usual.

When Sarah entered the apartment, Steve was sitting on the couch staring at the TV but not really watching whatever was playing. He seemed lost in thought.

“Steve?” she asked.

“Oh, hi, Ma. Sorry, just thinking.”

“You wanna talk about it?”

“Yeah. I guess I ought to.” Steve paused and Sarah was about to say that he didn’t have to say anything right now, but then he continued, “Jamie asked me to tell you that he’s transgender. He’s a boy, and he wants to be called Bucky. Well, actually he said Buck, but he calls me Stevie, so I call him Bucky. Peggy is the only other person who knows, and she... wasn’t very understanding about it.”

“That’s why sh- _he_ was crying this morning.”

“Yeah. So, if you would call him Buck and he and stuff here, when it’s just us, I know he would really appreciate it.”

“Of course Steve. He’s your best friend. He’s like another son to me. I always thought of him as the daughter I never had, but I guess that’s wrong; he’s another son. You’re around each other so much, I wondered if you two might end up dating.”

“MA… No. Bucky is definitely just like a brother. But, um, while we’re discussing coming out… I’m bisexual…?”

“Is that a question, Steve?”

“No. No, I am definitely bisexual.”

“Thank you for telling me. I’m so proud of you,” Sarah said as she hugged her son tightly.

“MA!” he squealed. After she let him go, and they paused for a moment, Steve asked, “so you’re really totally cool with Bucky being trans?”

“Yes, Steve, and with you being bi. It doesn’t change the fact that you’re still my son whom I love. And Bucky is still the same person who’s been your best friend as long as you’ve both been alive. I might mess up sometimes, but I still love you. Both of you. Okay?”

“Thanks, ma. I love you too.”


End file.
